


Had a Heart

by Neffectual



Series: one step forward, two steps back [10]
Category: BritWres, Professional Wrestling, Progress Wrestling
Genre: Blood and Violence, Gen, Introspection, References to Depression
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-13
Updated: 2018-07-13
Packaged: 2019-06-09 14:26:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 964
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15269427
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Neffectual/pseuds/Neffectual
Summary: Jimmy's aware that he's part of what keeps Progress going, keeps it living, but he doesn't know what it is that drives him to continue.





	Had a Heart

If you opened up the ribs of Progress, there he'd be, beating thick, rich, red lifeblood, and if you then took the shears and opened up his ribs - he doesn't know what you'd find, but he knows it wouldn't be anything as normal as a human heart.

But he's not at all certain it wouldn't be Ospreay - the thing that drives him on, the thing that sends him back to the fucking gym, the thing that tells him the aches are all going to be worth it in the morning, that reminds him he's been hurt worse than this before. He was weak, weak enough to bow his head for the axe, just for a moment, with the pins in his feet telling him not to get up again, not for anything, but he swore he’d never be weak again. He’s been that lost boy at someone’s feet, and he promised himself that this was one game he’d never be stupid enough to think he can try to beat.

But for all his bravado, the way he lifts his chin, Ospreay’s a lost boy too, they’re broken in all the wrong ways so that rather than fitting together like puzzle pieces, they slice into each other and can’t be disentangled without at least one of them bleeding. When Will says he no longer needs to prove himself to anyone, Jimmy can see the echo of himself there. Neither of them has anything to prove to the outside world, that might be true, but if, in the night, they could prove to themselves that they were worth a fragment of the love that’s touched them, they might have a victory worth winning.

When he hears Ospreay won’t make Wembley, when he hears the shit about dates and scheduling, he finds himself slumped on the floor, head in his hands, trying to pretend the tears are rage and not abject misery at waiting a second longer to prove that he’s not lying down and meekly going to slaughter, he’s not a lamb anymore, and mutton knows how to keep surviving. He’s on a losing streak, and Spike’s words, fed to him by Will – he won’t have that. It’s bad enough everyone knowing his business, bad enough working all week because home is something you build in the hearts of other people, and his home is no longer open to him. If he had a heart, he thinks, the pain would be unbearable. As it is, there’s beer and brawls and bleeding, and he can fake better than anyone he knows that it’s not bothering him that this is all there is.

It’s not about the match. It’s not about the match, about Ospreay, about Spike, about losing match after match after match until the voices shouting his name in the crowd are like the tiny sounds of people claiming he has worth – it’s not about whether he’s worth anything. He’s always fought like an alley cat, knowing his skin’s worth little and what’s underneath it even less, never afraid to bite or claw, to use every weapon to his own advantage; but always fighting for your own survival means that you never pull your punches, even when the person you’re fighting is yourself, in the dark of the night. He doesn’t remember getting half his scars, but it’s impolite to talk about yourself.

So Wembley’s out, which means months of watching his back, checking behind every door, waiting for that familiar figure to darken the doorway again and take him down. At this point, he’s not sure how much further there is to fall, whether there’s anything underneath crawling on your hands and knees in your own blood to the jeers of a crowd who are more fickle than the weather, in this drought of support. His lungs burn when he thinks about when it’ll happen, what it’s going to be, and whether this is it. Whether this is when he hands the mantle over to Ospreay, gives him the nod, and steps away.

But fuck that – anyone who knows him has seen him hold onto glory with both fucking hands, nails dug in, clutching it to his body like a shield, because he’s not one to just let go of anything, and especially not to some prick who thinks he knows it all just because he’s made it big in Japan. He built this scene, and while they may have built Progress together, that’s a couple of dates a month, that’s a couple of videos and a few tweets, that’s not what he does for a living. A living is night after night, small halls and big, working with big names and cunts he’s never fucking met before, sometimes all in the same night, and with every international date, making waves. Ospreay can call him an old dog, but he doesn’t need new tricks to run rings around him – he doesn’t intend to run at all. Ospreay learnt darkness, but Jimmy’s never had to bother, it’s been there for years, telling him he’s worthless, that he can’t do anything, that no one will ever love him, and he’s made it a weapon, throwing it back at an opponent to briefly illuminate all their faults, and see themselves for the towers of lies they really are.

If you opened up the ribs of Progress, there he'd be, beating thick, rich, red lifeblood, and if you then took the shears and opened up his ribs – there’d be his heart, steadily beating away despite the way love always seems to freeze the blood in his veins, elevated heart rate no help against the cold rush of knowledge that this is wrestling; that Progress needs him, but this is real life. There’s always a chance of a heart transplant.


End file.
